At last we can begin to plan our lives for the next ten months, as the fixtures are out. We start 2017/18 with a trip to Bolton Wanderers.
And the interference from Sky TV has started already, as the opening game has been put back to the Sunday with a 4.30 kick-off, on a day when no trains will be running to the ‘Horwich Parkway’ station next to the stadium.
Obviously the TV companies are far more important than the clubs themselves, as Bolton asked the League not to give them any high profile home games in August, while the railway passing the Macron will be closed for electrification work. Naturally this request was completely ignored.
The first home game in the league will be Preston on the following Saturday, and presumably the home League Cup game against Port Vale will now be on the Wednesday night between. The next two away trips are quite big ones, to Sunderland and Forest, before the pleasures of going to Millwall on September 16th.
Regrettably the South-East London mob are back on the fixture list after their play-off win last month. But generally the travelling looks a bit easier than in the last couple of years, with fewer games in midweek, and even these are mostly avoiding clubs a long way from Leeds.
Cardiff should be the only evening trip south of the midlands, though Fulham on Easter Monday could move to day a later in that week. But this might mean an end to those fun-packed beam-back nights at Elland Road, when we gather to watch midweek games taking place at the other end of the country.
Christmas week starts with a local derby at home to Hull on December 23rd, then we’re off to Burton on Boxing Day, before we face Birmingham and Forest either side of new year’s eve. And the last two games see us travelling to Norwich before we finish by playing QPR at Elland Road. Hopefully we’ll still have plenty to play for by then, but perhaps we won’t.
For copyright reasons we’re not allowed to publish the fixtures in full, but you can click here to bring up the full list on the official site.